


This spark of black that I seem to love

by illuminatedcities



Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: D/s undertones, M/M, Mr.Egret!Harold
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-11
Updated: 2015-05-11
Packaged: 2018-03-30 02:56:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3920284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/illuminatedcities/pseuds/illuminatedcities
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Mr. Egret,” he says, voice gravel rough, and Harold closes his mouth. “Would certainly order his employee to do what he wants.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	This spark of black that I seem to love

The shift is subtle, like a breath of air on the side of John’s face, but something changes in Harold the second they walk into the underground casino. It’s a dimly lit room with mirrors on the walls on one side, a dark wooden bar and scattered playing tables, and John listens to the sound of the Roulette wheel and the ice clinking on the inside of glasses and stores them in the back of his brain as background noise. He listens instead to Harold’s steps on the carpet, the sound of his breath, steady despite the way he is surveying the room.

John isn’t convinced that it’s a good idea to bring Harold along into the field, but apparently his fake weapon dealer identity has important connections to the kind of people they will need to get in touch with for this number, and Harold apparently has gotten a taste for undercover work, if his stubbornness in the matter is anything to go by.

“Mr. Egret?”

A man with slicked back black hair and an ill fitting suit approaches them, and John has to fight down the urge to bare his teeth at him. The exit is on the opposite end of the room, and if he gets into a fight, there’s no way he can protect Harold effectively at the same time. His instinct is to lean in closer to Harold’s space, but then he sees the expression in Harold’s eyes and stops dead in his tracks.

“You might want to speak up, the table in the back corner hasn’t heard you yet,” he says, except his voice doesn’t sound like Harold’s at all: It’s clipped, with a hint of impatience, and beneath that a solid layer of steel.

The man blinks, his cheeks turning red.

“Apologies,” he mumbles, “please follow me.”

Usually, John would stay firmly by Harold’s side, but he lets himself fall back two steps, following behind.

Mr. Egret turns and gives him a short look, his mouth a firm line. He gives the barest indication of a nod, and John feels a hot shiver run down his spine with the feeling of appreciation.

They are lead into a private back room with a single poker table in the middle. Across from them a man with grey hair is counting neat stacks of dollar bills like poker chips.

“Ah, Mr. Egret, what a pleasure.”

John pulls out the chair before he realizes that he’s doing it.

Mr. Egret gives him a dark look that he can’t read, and sits down without a word. John retreats to the back of the room, where he can see the door.

The transaction is quick, Mr. Egret exchanging the black briefcase for a similar one filled with cash.

“I hope the quality of the merchandise is as good as you’ve promised,” the grey-haired man says.

The temperature in the room drops a few degrees.

“If you’re implying that I would sell products of poor quality, you might want to reconsider that course of action. My employee would take great pleasure in breaking every single one of your fingers, I’d imagine,” Mr. Egret says, his calm voice like a blade to the throat.

John is tingling all over with the sound of his voice, that calm, self-assured control in it. He’s sweating, the hairs on the back of his neck standing up. John takes a deep breath through his nose and shifts his weight from one foot to another, he’s half hard in his pants.

“That’s not what I was trying to say at all,” the man says, too quickly, and stands. “I hope you have a good day. Pleasure doing business with you.”

Mr. Egret fixes him with a cold, unblinking stare before slowly getting to his feet. He indicates the suitcase with a flick of his wrist and John jumps, reaching across the table to get it. He opens the door, and Mr. Egret passes him without a look.

John tries to focus on his steps instead of the fog in his head, his hand clenched around the handle of the suitcase.

Mr. Egret walks through the crowd like somebody who is completely certain that people will get out of his way.

When he opens the door, the bright sunlight is beating down from the sky, and they both blink, their eyes accustomed to the darkness of the casino.

“Well, that went rather well,” he says, still blinking, shielding his eyes from the sun with a hand.

Now he’s Harold again, looking at John like nothing out of the ordinary just happened, and John just – he just –

John walks straight past him, down the deserted alley where he parked the car hidden from sight behind a couple of large trashcans, and opens the door to throw the briefcase on the backseat with shaking hands.

“Mr. Reese?” Harold asks, limping after him with a worried expression on his face.

John opens the door and lets himself sink down in the driver’s seat. His pulse is racing, a consistent, hot throbbing in his ears and throat.

The door on the other side opens, and Harold appears in his peripheral vision, sitting down and giving him an inquisitive look.

“Is something the matter?” he asks, and John knows that he should turn the key in the ignition and drive, that he should let everything slide off of him like water, but he feels like somebody just injected him with a shot of adrenaline straight to the heart and if he doesn’t do something he might just lose his mind.

He leans over and kisses Harold, and Harold makes a startled sound, his hands coming up to either pull him closer or push him away, John isn’t sure which, until a hand slides into his hair, tugging softly. Harold’s fingernails scrape against his scalp and he’s gone, every bit of reasonable caution wiped from his mind.

John reaches down for the lever and pushes Harold’s seat back before climbing into the foot well, Harold panting above him, as if he had been running the distance towards the car.

John makes short work of his belt and fly and Harold raises his hips to give him room to work, apparently very okay with John getting down on his knees in front of him in broad daylight.

“John,” Harold says, his hand still in John’s hair, and for a moment John expects him to stop him, make some very reasonable point about boundaries or emotional attachment, but instead he just looks at him like John is a puzzle to be solved.

John pushes himself up on his arms to kiss Harold again, and this time Harold is apparently prepared because his lips part under John’s easily, and it’s even better with Harold kissing him back, making soft humming noises into his mouth as if this still isn’t enough to shut him up.

Even if this is where it all goes to hell between them, John thinks, it might just be worth it.

When they part, Harold’s eyes are huge and startled behind this glasses.

“I didn’t know you wanted to do that,” Harold says, sounding almost defensive.

John wants to explain, to tell him that he didn’t know how much he wanted to until about ten minutes ago, that he didn’t realize what Harold could give him if John had just thought of asking, but he is stopped by the way Harold is touching him. His thumb rests at the corner of John’s mouth, and John realizes that it’s not a rejection at all, that Harold is just trying to understand.

“Do you want me to –“ John asks, dropping his eyes to where Harold clearly doesn’t have any objections to John kneeling in front of him, if the bulge in his underwear is any indication, and Harold says: “Yes, please, yes.” and John leans down again, pulling down Harold’s boxers.

“You can tell me to do it,” John says, avoiding his eyes while he speaks, and only daring to look up after a moment has passed in silence.

Harold stares down at him as if the thought itself is revolting.

“Why would I ever – How could you possibly think I’d –“, Harold starts, apparently able to start a rant about moral imperatives while sporting an impressive erection, and John squeezes his eyes shut.

“Mr. Egret,” he says, voice gravel rough, and Harold closes his mouth. “Would certainly order his employee to do what he wants.”

The expression in Harold’s face is unreadable, and John has the horrible feeling of a trapdoor opening up in the floor beneath him.

“And his employee would enjoy that?” Harold asks, mercifully quick on the uptake as usual.

“Yes,” John says, relieved, “yes, he would.”

Harold looks down at him and raises an eyebrow.

“Well, you should get to it, then, I don’t have all day,” he says, his tone flat and unimpressed, and John shudders and bows his head.

Harold hisses at the first touch of John’s lips against his warm skin, his hand tightening in John’s hair. John makes a pleased sound and Harold pulls his hair experimentally, barely enough to hurt, and John makes a sound low in his throat, his hips pushing forward reflexively.

John leans down to take Harold deeper into his mouth, his hand wrapped around the base of his cock, flattening out his tongue and relaxing his jaw while he can still hear Harold breathing over the sound of the blood rushing in his ears.

“Is that the best you can do?” Harold asks, sounding positively bored even though his voice is shaking slightly on the last syllable, and John marvels at how easily Harold does it, how much John wants to stay kneeling at his feet and never get up again.

John let his cock slide out of his mouth to lick at the head, moving his hand while sucking at the tip before sliding his mouth down again, and Harold says “Yes, that’s it, just like that,” before making a strangled sound and tugging at John’s collar in warning.

John responds by sucking harder, and Harold groans and comes, nails digging into John’s shoulder in little spots of sweet pain.

John sits back on his heels after, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, while Harold sits with his eyes closed, trying to catch his breath, hand clenched on the side of the door as if holding on for dear life.

John stretches his cramping legs and climbs back into his own seat when Harold grabs him by the cuff of his shirt.

“What do you think you’re doing?”Harold asks, squinting at him.

He looks thoroughly debauched, and John wants to reach out and flatten his hair where it sticks up from his head in a weird angle.

“Drive back. We need to see if there’s a new number,” John says.

Harold stares at him as if he had just suggested to run away to Barcelona together.

“No,” Harold says simply, and John stops where he was reaching for the key, hand hovering in the air.

“228 Park Avenue,” Harold says, pulling out his phone.

John starts the engine and drives mechanically, only bothering to put on his seat belt when Harold reminds him. Harold doesn’t look up from his phone for the entire drive, apparently taking care of things with a swipe of his thumb on the screen.  
He only puts it away when John parks the car and kills the engine, still unsure of what do to.

“Follow me,” Harold says, and that John can do.

They walk through a marble foyer where the doorman doesn’t even spare Harold a passing glance, and Harold puts a little silver key into the switching console. The elevator starts up.

“Phone”, Harold says and John hands it to him without even asking.

Harold tucks it away in a pocket of his jacket.

 

The doors open to a spacious penthouse suite, huge windows covered with half transparent white curtains, the furniture wood and soft looking dark leather.

Harold walks in and drops his keys into a bowl by the door. He takes off his jacket and folds it neatly over a chair.

He walks across the room to a king sized bed with sinfully smooth looking linens, and fixes John with a level look.

“Take off your clothes,” he says, not bothering to raise his voice or even trying for a stern infliction, and John is out of his jacket and working on his belt before Harold has even finished the sentence.

“On your back,” Harold says, apparently determined to stay in character now that he knows what John wants, and John climbs onto the bed, stretching out on the soft sheets.

Harold unbuttons his shirt and cuffs and loses his vest before joining him on the bed.

“Hold on to the headboard with your hands and keep them there,” Harold says.

John swallows hard.

“Harold,” he says, through his too-tight throat, and alarm crosses Harold’s face, the act slipping for a moment. “I’m fine, I really am, I just wanted to say – I wanted to say thank you.”

The expression on Harold’s face disappears instantly, his gaze turning soft.

  
“You can ask me for whatever you want, John, didn’t you know,” he says, and John is so relieved that he could choke on it.

He raises his arms over his head and grips the headboard.

“Your safeword is, as far as I’m concerned, “No” or “Don’t” or “Stop”, is that something we can agree on?” Harold makes a face. “I do realize that the timing of this conversation is somewhat inappropriate.”

John can feel laughter bubbling up in his chest at Harold’s chagrined face.

“That’s okay, Harold,” John says. “I trust you.”

Harold looks at him as if John has given him something extraordinary.

“I’m sure we can figure this out,” Harold says, and finally puts his hands on him.


End file.
